Fred Willard

Best known for his buttoned-up professionals with no sense of their own cluelessness, actor Fred Willard emerged from the 1960s improv scene to become a critic's favorite and an admired comedy veteran...
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The job of a romantic comedy best friend may look easy. But these ladies (and dudes) have the difficult gig of supporting every scheme, participating in every song and dance number, and occasionally ending up with the romantic hero's less dashing compatriot, all while doing their best not to steal the leading lady's spotlight. Here are a few of the BFF performances that are a credit to the genre.
Kit in Pretty Woman
Vivan gets all the "hooker with a heart of gold" credit. But what about Kit (Laura San Giacomo) who, instead of being jealous of her best friend's luck, encourages her to go live her fairy tale?
Becky in Sleepless in Seattle
Becky (Rosie O'Donnell) gives Annie a reality check when she expects her real life to play out like a movie, but will still be sitting next to her for every hundreth viewing of An Affair to Remember, sharing a box of tissues.
Marie in When Harry Met Sally
Sometimes the role of the rom-com sidekick is to make the heroine feel more together by comparison. Before getting together with Harry's best friend, Marie (Carrie Fisher) is stuck on a married guy who she, Sally, and pretty much everyone knows is never going to leave his wife.
Kate in Only You
It's helpful for a leading lady to have the kind of friend who has no qualms about making snap decisions that most normal people would find insane, like when Kate (Bonnie Hunt) drops her entire life to tag along with Faith on an impromptu trip to Italy.
Penny in The Wedding Planner
Cute, spunky, and high-strung, Penny (Judy Greer) is there to take care of business when Mary runs off in search of love, or whatever.
George in My Best Friend's Wedding
George (Rupert Everett) doesn't know he's the sidekick and steals every scene he's in. But all is forgiven when he shows up at Michael's wedding and quite literally sweeps a defeated Jules off her feet.
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Over the past few months we’ve laughed until we’ve cried with HBO’s original comedy Family Tree, starring Chris O’Dowd, and now the phenomenal first season is coming to a close. To help elevate your separation anxiety, Hollywood.com is giving away an HBO Prize Pack filled with star-studded prizes!
Ready to win? You’re just one tweet away! Here's how to enter:
1. Head to Twitter and tell @Hollywood_com which actor from Family Tree you wish belonged to your family and why. 2. Include the hashtag #HollywoodGiveaway 3. Make sure you do all this by 11:59 PM PT Sunday, June 30 and we'll choose a winner at random.
Sorry guys, only citizens of the United States are eligible to win this prize pack.)
Get excited, HBO fans, and take a look at all the goodies you could win in this ultimate Family Tree giveaway listed below:
The winner of the contest will receive a Family Tree poster (pictured above) signed by stars Michael McKean, Carrie Ainzley, Don Lake, Ed Begley Jr. and Fred Willard as well as the creators Christopher Guest and Jim Piddock.
Can’t get enough of Guest’s quirky comedy? Neither can we! The winner will also receive 3 DVDs from Guest’s past cinematic hits including, This is Spinal Tap, Best In Show, and Waiting for Guffman.
The winner will be revealed Monday, July 1 at 9 AM PST/12 PM EST with a direct message on Twitter — so make sure you’re following Hollywood.com for your chance to win! And remember to tune in to HBO’s Family Tree Sunday nights at 10:30 PM.
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Oblivion may be the most thoroughly derivative science-fiction film in recent memory. The Tom Cruise post-apocalyptic action film directed by Joseph Kosinski ransacks 50 years of classics in the genre. But for what purpose? Not apparently for winking irony. Or to make some kind of tongue-in-cheek pastiche that's a statement about the recurrence of certain sci-fi tropes. The movie would have to be funny for that to be the case, and it's deadly serious. In fact, you could probably even tell in the trailers for Oblivion just how many movies it's referencing intentionally, subconsciously, or kleptomaniac-ally. These are 12 films whose makers should be crying "Stop, thief!"
1. 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) — If you need to telegraph mechanical villainy stat, you know what to do. Give the evil machine in question a pulsing red eye, just like neurotic supercomputer HAL 9000 in Stanley Kubrick's film. That's also what Andrew Stanton and the makers of WALL-E decided to do for their villain in the Pixar film. But Oblivion goes further, also giving 2001's slow-moving spherical pods a turbo-charged upgrade so they can scour the irradiated Earth for targets to blast.
2. WALL-E (2008) — Speaking of the little 'bot, WALL-E actually casts a giant shadow over Oblivion. For one basic reason. It's because Tom Cruise's Jack is WALL-E. He's been left behind on Earth to oversee clean-up while the rest of humanity abandoned the planet to take refuge on Titan, one of Saturn's moons, following the war with the Scavengers, an alien race who invaded our planet, destroyed our moon, and caused us to seek a safe haven off-world. Jack even shares WALL-E's affinity for little green plants, an affinity that Olga Kurylenko's Julia also shares with him, making her the film's EVE. Andrea Riseborough's Victoria is Auto, the rogue automatic pilot artificial intelligence program on-board the Axiom that wants to destroy plants so as to prove that earth is uninhabitable. And Melissa Leo's Southern belle dispatcher is Fred Willard's Buy 'n Large CEO.
3. La Jetée (1962) — In Chris Marker's seminal time-travel film about a nuclear war survivor who's sent back in time to get aid for post-apocalytic Earth, or stop the war outright, the one thing keeping the unnamed protagonist sane is his powerful memory of a beautiful woman from before the war. That mental image sustains him, much like the way Jack's mysterious memory of touring New York with Olga Kurylenko's Julia sustains and fascinates him.
4. Planet of the Apes (1968) — Franklin Schaffner's parable about bigotry and ignorance, starring Charlton Heston as an astronaut who gets lost in space and crashes on a planet populated by intelligent but xenophobic simians, pioneered the idea of showing ruined versions of iconic landmarks to indicate an apocalyptic setting. Most notably? The Statue of Liberty jutting out of a beach. Likewise, Oblivion shows the Statue of Liberty's torch dislodged and caught in a rocky ravine. Actually, Tom Cruise's Jack only seems to visit the ruins of iconic landmarks: the Empire State Building, the Pentagon, the Washington Monument, and a Super Bowl stadium are all on his sightseeing list.
5. Prometheus (2012) — Oh yeah, and if it wasn't already obvious that Oblivion shares its washed-out, icy gray hues with Prometheus, consider that they were both shot in Iceland, the new go-to sci-fi location.
6. Dune (1984) — Like Frank Herbert's novel, and David Lynch's quixotic 1984 adaptation of it, Tom Cruise's Jack has a revelation that makes him switch sides in the war he's been fighting. (It's not a spoiler to say that, since it's right in the trailer.) By the end, I almost expected co-star Nikolaj Coster-Waldau to pay messianic tribute to Jack by shouting, "And how can this be? For he is the Kwisatz Haderach!"
7. The Matrix (1999) — In order for Jack to have everything he knows about his world upended, he needs to have an inspirational mentor figure just like Morpheus. Only instead of Laurence Fishburne, it's Morgan Freeman. He doesn't wear leather trench coats, but he does don goggle-glasses and a cape. And smoke cigars! Because it may be the end of the world, but that's no excuse for you not to look cool. Also, there is an image near the end of the film in which we see thousands of humans in pods very much like those the machines in The Matrix use to feed off human beings' body heat.
8. Blade Runner (1982) — Much of the mystery in Ridley Scott's dystopian thriller centers on one question: Is Harrison Ford's Decker a human being, or is he a Replicant, a machine made to look human? Jack begins to question his identity in Oblivion as well.
9. Minority Report (2002) — It's a Tom Cruise movie stealing from a Tom Cruise movie! My mind is twisted like an ouroboros just thinking about it. Andrea Riseborough's Victoria uses giant console touchscreens just like Cruise's pre-crime agent in Steven Spielberg's film.
10. Aliens (1986) — Olga Kurylenko's Julia was in hyper-sleep, a state of suspended animation, for a long, long time. Much like Aliens' Ripley, who slept more than half a century after the events of Alien.
11. Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) — How do you convey an event of global magnitude that's also really, really weird? Show a ship tanker beached on dry land. Only an alien force, an apocalyptic event, or both could make that happen, right? Steven Spielberg had a tanker re-materialize in the Gobi Desert in his symphonic alien-abduction epic, and Joseph Kosinski does the same to indicate the world-ending mess humanity's finding itself in the middle of.
12. Independence Day (1996) — Like Roland Emmerich's alien invasion film, Kosinski's alien invasion film involves a trip into the belly of the beast. Look at this little ship being swallowed Jonah-like by this much bigger ship! We make no promises about there being a fat lady singing, however.
Did you catch Oblivion this weekend?
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For a while there, we could set our watches to Christopher Guest's directorial schedule. Every three-and-a-half years, the mockumentarian would release another gem: Waiting for Guffman, Best in Show, A Mighty Wind, For Your Consideration. All dry and satirical, all celebratory of their shared performers' mile-deep pools of talent, all unique. But the pattern halted after the latter, Oscar-mocking picture, leaving us without a cinematic Guest gem since 2006. But if he's just been spending all that time developing his new HBO comedy Family Tree, then we can probably forgive him. Especially since he's roping in the comedy world's new prince, Chris O'Dowd.
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The below trailer for the film lands Irish O'Dowd among Guest's usual clan of American, British, and American-feigning-British heroes, including Michael McKean, Jim Piddock, Ed Begley, Jr., Don Lake, Bob Balaban, and (the powerhouse) Fred Willard. Will the rest of the troupe show up for the program? Eugene Levy, Catherine O'Hara, Parker Posey? We can hope... but for now, we're just pleased with what we're already seeing:
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[Photo Credit: Ray Burmiston/HBO]
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From the second Britta says to Abed, “I hereby therapize you,” we know we’re in for a wild journey through the recesses of Abed’s never-ending imagination on the Season 4 premiere of Community. It’s the perfect way to return to Greendale: by experiencing it through a ‘90s multi-cam sitcom lens, and later through an even simpler ‘90s cartoon lens. If we can’t have Dan Harmon, lord please give us some Abed.
We open on Abed’s happy place, and to Britta’s dismay, it’s not the babbling brook she taped a picture of to her notebook, but an evenly-lit three-walled version of the study room. Each of our favorite characters are boiled down to their bases essences, especially Jeff, who literally tells the room “congratulations” when he comes in. It’s a dream we didn’t realize Abed had, but when he replaces Pierce with Fred Willard, it all makes sense. Much like fans of TV’s remaining multi-cam giggle-fests: this reality is simply easier to take.
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The dark Harmon edges may be missing in this fourth season of Community, but the smart pop culture commentary mixed with the heartfelt antics of six best friends (and Pierce) delivers enough to keep us happy.
And while Abed’s Happy Community College Show on Abed TV may poke fun at the multi-cam sitcom, it also shows a great reverence for the format as an essential component of TV’s ability to act as an escape, a way of soothing us when life is simply too much. Community is not that same simplistic escape, and it’s a shame that an easy multi-cam show like The Big Bang Theory continues to crush it in the ratings, but they both have a spot on television. Abed says so.
When we come back into the “real” world, it’s the first day of senior year, Annie is “doing senioritis,” and Jeff is actually doing his best to help the whole group get into the overbooked history class: History of Ice Cream.
He’s even sending away cute, ditzy girls obsessed with Instagramming themselves (low hanging hipster jokes, ahoy), but there’s a catch: the Dean has set this whole thing up. He’s “forged” his own course cards, claiming his foolproof system of pink notecards and sharpies has been “hacked.” Oh, Dean. You’re not even trying to hide it now. (We missed you.)
Then we’re in it: the games the promos have been teasing for weeks. The Hunger Deans are a game that pits all the students against each other for a chance at ice cream (and that history credit for learning about the history of said tasty treat). It turns out Jeff took summer classes and he needs this class, which is the only history credit this semester (suspicious much?), to graduate early. “I want us to take the class together I just wanted it to be the last class we take together,” he says to the dismay of the whole group.
The notion that college is almost over, and that that day may come sooner for Jeff than the others, plays games with everyone. Annie, who’s busy executing senioritis by not sayin’ her Gs, is suddenly terrified of the boring future she’s been working for. But it’s Abed who takes this stimulus as an excuse to retreat to Abed TV, where the Dean has lost the MS Paint file that stored the school records, forcing the friendly friends to stick around for three more years to play catch up.
When Jeff throws down his Jobs magazine to chase from freshman hotties, Abed is totally comfortable, back in the glow of the reality he thinks he knows best.
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Jeff, convinced he’s “New Jeff” and not “Old Jeff,” who’s self-serving and addicted to texting. He dives headfirst into the Hunger Deans, nabbing six unforgeable balls (damn that Dean’s bite-mark system!) so he and his friends can take the ice cream class together. He won’t do it without them, but he really wants that credit, so he’s going to spend all his energy getting those balls. (Don’t worry, Pierce knows there’s a joke somewhere in all this.)
Jeff sexy tangos the Dean into submission and gets the truth: the Dean took away all the history classes and set up this elaborate ruse thinking Jeff wouldn’t participate in order to keep him at Greendale longer. Jeff doesn’t seem all that upset by it.
But when Britta and Troy return from their pseudo-erotic couple fight in the fountain after Britta fails to play by Abed’s rules for wishing in the fountain, Abed’s happy place has become a real problem. Abed’s Happy Community College Show characters, like all sitcom characters, have found a sudden way out of their problems: a safe, shaped like a rubber ball that contains backups of their school records. Huzzah? Not for Abed.
He retreats further into his happy place within a happy place: a shameless rip-off (or homage, depending on how you look at it) of Muppet Babies called Greendale Babies. It’s an even easier, more infantile version of escape and Abed is stuck there when he plays out the gang’s motto about playing together FOREVER.
Troy realizes Abed is not f-y-n-e, but f-i-n-e (which is code for “not fine”), and Britta admits she told Abed to go to a happy place in his mind. It takes all of Troy’s patience to not lose it on his new girlfriend (or something), and has the whole group hold hands with Abed so they can incept him out of his multiple dream levels. But it doesn’t work. They need Jeff, who must choose between Abed and the last Hunger Dean ball.
He ultimately makes the right choice, and Abed’s imagination gives cartoon baby Jeff a speech to deliver about change and how it’s difficult, but necessary.
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It’s a speech we can’t help but feel is directed at us. We’re resisting the change of a Harmon-less Community, and one whose final season may be flashing before our eyes right now. But as Abed says, everything he loves about the group was once the future.
So what’s the point in trying to stay in the past? Where’s the potential for finding the real life happy place with a group as perfect as the study group if we’re always insistent on stayi ng in the past?
There couldn’t be a better way for Community to come back to us. The dark edges brought by Harmon are gone, but that doesn’t mean we can’t come to find value in this change and this new future. And who better to teach us this lesson than Abed? (Besides, I’m pretty sure we wouldn’t have listened to anyone else.)
Of course, that doesn’t help the fact that in addition the Dean living next door to Jeff this semester, we’ll also have to deal with that naked, slimy Kevin with “Changnesia” next week. And just when we thought that whole battle for Greendale last season scared him off once and for all.
Grading on a Curve
A: Abed:
Abed was supposed to be envisioning a babbling brook for his happy place, but he pulled in layers of their world, something he knows will upset fans of the babbling brook, but he thought the initial universe was a bit limiting. +50
Abed has Jeff and the study group reading “Jobs” magazine while Pierce is reading “Coffins.” +60 Abed's reality TV show ad on Abed TV: American Sword Cooks +10
Troy and Abed living out a Bosom Buddies parody in the tag. +15
Score: 135
B: Troy
"I'm trying out the hipster look. It's cool, but also not." -Troy on his new hipster glasses +10 “Last year we wished for Osama Bin Laden and the Dorito taco.” -Abed "Yeah, but Obama got credit for both" -Troy +30
"F-i-n-e or F-y-n-e? We made one of them a code for 'not fine'" -Troy +35
"Why do I like this?" -Troy, being strangled by Britta +15
Score: 90
C: Shirley
Shirley is the one with real prank ideas even though Annie didn’t think she could handle “doing senioritis”: they fill the Dean’s car with popcorn. Yes, because that is an actual prank. +30
Shirley making her "Oh lord, no" a sassy catch phrase in Abed’s multi-cam sitcom. +50
Score: 80
C: Annie
Annie’s prank on the Dean is sneaking into his office so he’ll have the sneaking suspicion that someone was there. Okay, she’ll move his stapler. -15
"Yay hospital administrator! I can't wait to be buried alive under a pile of paperwork hoping to summon up the courage to talk to Dr. Patel, the gorgeous Indian neurosurgeon who doesn't even know I exist." -Annie while pranking the Dean. Woo, senioritis. Killer fake future backstory though, bro. +30
Score: 15
C: Jeff
“Is that blood on your shirt?” “No, it's cool, it's Leonard's.” - Jeff during the Hunger Deans +25
Score: 25
D: Britta
"Here's the deal, Jessica Biel" -Britta to Abed -5
"It's progressed, but it hasn't progressed progressed. It's progressing. It's progressive" -Britta, on her relationship with Troy -100
Britta does the wishing all wrong and wishes to “end all wars.” -50
Score: -155
F: Pierce
In Abed's happy place Pierce is played by a man who got caught jerking off in a movie theater instead of Chevy Chase. -1000
"If you want something you have to work for it or use a spell" -Pierce on Abed and Troy’s wishing well tradition +15
“There’s got to be a ball joke in here,” -Pierce, holding Jeff’s balls and failing to see that that is the joke -15
"All these balls. So close I can taste it.” -Pierce holding Jeff’s balls -20
"Gay balls! Nailed it!" -Pierce -1000
Score: -2020
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[Photo Credit: NBC]
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Guest has co-created a new show called Family Tree, which will star Bridesmaids actor Chris O'Dowd in the lead role as a man who suffers an identity crisis after losing his job and his girlfriend.
Guest will write, direct and appear in the BBC/HBO series along with his Spinal Tap co-stars Michael McKean and Fred Willard, and the show will be produced in the same "mockumentary" style as the 1984 rock comedy.
He says, "I am also delighted to welcome myself to BBC Television. I am very lucky to be working with an incredibly talented cast."
O'Dowd adds, "I'm terribly excited and monumentally under-qualified to work on an improvised show with Chris Guest. I call him Chris 'cos we are friends. He calls me George. I don't know why."
The show will be filmed in both the U.K. and U.S. and will air in the spring in both Britain and America.

Exactly 40 years ago, in the fall of 1972, a bunch of forward thinking creative forces led by actress Marlo Thomas banded together to develop the time honored album Free to Be... You and Me: a project whose mission statement was to teach young boys and girls how to appreciate themselves and not be restricted by society's barriers for gender and personal identity. Free to Be is considered a massive, longstanding success in the influence of American youths to embrace independent definitions for their personality and values. It truly does stand as a benchmark in the constant journey for both a greater understanding of the complexities of the human mind as well as for the plight to apply this education toward a more open-minded civilization. So, naturally, people are going to make fun of it now.
Comedy writer Rob Kutner (Conan), producer Stephen Levinson (Entourage, Boardwalk Empire), and comedian/that other dude's brother Joel Moss Levinson are headlining the new parody album It's OK to... Do Stuff, riffing on the sweet-natured earnestness of Free to Be. The album includes contributions from contemporary performers like Lizzy Caplan, Colin Hanks, Andy Richter, The Daily Show's Samantha Bee and Wyatt Cenac, Fred Willard, Parks and Recreation writer Megan Amram, Barenaked Ladies' Steven Page, and a slew of other "Oh yeah, I know them! They're pretty funny!" characters.
And to be honest, it probably will be funny. With names like those, and listed comedy titles such as "Be Yourself... Unless," "Wally Wants a Real Doll," and "Girl Meets Droid," the album is not likely to fall short in the laugh department. But that doesn't mean there isn't something a little off about the whole concept.
Parody and satire were invented to call attention to the flaws and follies, and often the evils, in an existing establishment. But the earnestness in Free to Be, the attitude perpetrated by the 1972 project, is not something that warrants this kind of treatment. Sure, if you were to sort through the tracks, you might well think up a few points wherein improvements could be made, possibly to reflect the changes our society has embraced since the album's release. But this sort of "flaw" doesn't call for mockery, it calls for update. A genuine revisit to Free to Be... You and Me, engaging with today's mentalities and the increased opportunity for open discussion and change, should be celebrated and welcomed.
And of course, I'm not trying to shoot down comedy as a venue for change. Comedians have historically instituted some of the most significant positive social changes our country has endured. And if that's the purpose of It's OK, to further the plight of Free to Be with a comical spin (perhaps to reach today's more cynical generation), then so be it — the best of luck to them. But if the only real endeavor is to make a joke about something everybody knows, something wholly good and important, then my only question is simply, "Why?"
[Photo Credit: Todd Oren/Getty Images]
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My, my, my, look at these big ole tidbitties! So many, for as far as the eye can see! For those of us not currently battling the ramifications of Sandy's wrath, today was filled with all sorts of information about your favorite stars, shows, and everything in between. So what are you waiting for? Dig in to the tidbits, they're just sitting here.
Chloe Sevigny to Kill at A&amp;E: After being discharged from American Horror Story's Briarcliff Manor, Chloe Sevigny is set to star as Catherine—a justice-seeking detective who spends too much time working—in a new pilot for A&amp;E. Called Those Who Kill and based off a preexisting Danish program, the show will revolve around Sevigny's Catherine and all the stress of old anger and sadness that weighs her down. The drama will find Sevigny’s character working alongside a forensic profiler who's yet to be cast. [EW]
Fred Willard Moves to Cleveland: Hang onto your hats, Cleveland, because Fred Willard has just booked himself a guest spot on TVLand's hit comedy Hot in Cleveland. Willard is set to play Dr. Thomas Hill, a war vet and grade-school flame of Mamie Sue, played by Georgia Engel. The episode will air in the later half of December. [THR]
Animal Practice to Close One Week Early: The show, which has been bullied by ratings and already cancelled by the network, has added an insult to its injury. NBC has decided to pull the last scheduled episode of the cancelled freshman comedy which was slated to air tomorrow night in order to make room for the storm-impacted Monday edition of The Voice. Poor Annie's Boobs (the monkey, you perverts!) [Deadline]
Sebastian Moves from Lima, Ohio to Beverly Hills: Kurt will certainly be happy about this one: Grant Gustin, also known as resident Glee/Dalton Academy bad-boy, Sebastian Smythe, has booked a multiple-episode arc the CW's 90210. He's set to play Campbell, a charming and good-looking college student from a wealthy and privileged background. So basically the same character from Glee, but the college years? Interesting! Gustin will have a multi-episode arc on the show. [THR]
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The This is Spinal Tap star was arrested for allegedly masturbating while watching a porn film at Hollywood's Tiki Theater in July (12), but he insisted it was all a big misunderstanding and managed to reach a deal with authorities to avoid formal prosecution.
As part of the agreement, lawmakers told Willard the case would be dropped if he completed an Alternative Prosecution Programme consisting of a two-week course.
The funnyman has since fulfilled his part of the deal and the investigation has now been closed.
He tells TMZ.com, "That's all over with. Everything's done... It was nothing. The charges were dropped."
The 73 year old maintained his innocence after the arrest, but the incident cost him his job as narrator for the PBS reality TV show Market Warriors, while ABC network bosses also axed the funnyman's improvisation series Trust Us With Your Life.

The New Orleans Police Department has issued an arrest warrant for Oscar-winning actor Cuba Gooding Jr. (Jerry Maguire) for allegedly shoving a female bartender at the Old Absinthe House on Bourbon Street.
According to an NOPD press release, a female bartender saw Gooding enter the French Quarter bar with a group of people around 3:00 a.m. Within minutes other customers started to recognize him and wanted to take pictures with him, which led to Gooding becoming “very aggravated with them.” The bartender then approached Gooding to calm him down, and he allegedly shoved her with an open hand. Another Old Absinthe House employee called the police, and upon informing Gooding that the police were on the way, he allegedly pushed the bartender again and left the bar.
There is currently an arrest warrant out for Gooding, 44, on charges of municipal battery.
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Summary

Best known for his buttoned-up professionals with no sense of their own cluelessness, actor Fred Willard emerged from the 1960s improv scene to become a critic's favorite and an admired comedy veteran. After earning an initial cult following as the dimwitted sidekick of talk show host Martin Mull in the cutting-edge parody "Fernwood 2-Night" (syndicated, 1977-78), Willard fans generally caught glimpses of the actor in character roles as self-assured and wildly incorrect authority figures in unremarkable film and television comedies. But his supporting roles in the "mockumentary" style films of Christopher Guest, beginning with "This is Spinal Tap" (1984), truly showcased Willard's unique gifts for creating memorable middle America characters largely through on-camera improvisation. Among his most beloved Guest-directed performances were that of a dog show sports commentator unschooled in the sport in "Best in Show" (2000) and as an overbearing entertainment news host in "For Your Consideration" (2006). Willard also received acclaim for guest-starring stints on "Everybody Loves Raymond" (CBS, 1996-2005) and "Roseanne" (ABC, 1988-1997), which, to the delight of pop culture historians, allowed him to work again with Fernwood's Martin Mull. Because of his gift for improvisational comedy, Willard remained a frequent late night guest while continuing to work steadily well into the next millennium.

Education

Name

Kentucky Military Institute

Virginia Military Institute

Notes

On working improvisationally in the Christopher Guest films "Waiting for Guffman" (1996) and "Best in Show" (2000): "It is quite scary. you have to do your homework and you have to come prepared. It's not just free-form improvisation like you'd see in a comedy club. You know exactly who your character is and you know exactly where the scene is going to begin and end. And Chris knows exactly what he wants. I never heard him say, 'Oh no, you're on the wrong track.'" – from the Daily News, Sept. 24, 2000

Willard was arrested on July 18, 2012. The actor was allegedly engaged in a lewd act while at the Tiki Theater in Hollywood, CA.